Talkin' Shit About A Pretty Sunset

Hey, if he's accepted as calling them such, then more power to him. However, do you think maybe they just don't tell him it's offensive because they don't want to be rude?

Personally, I don't like being called Oriental.

And I grew up with white people.

Go figure.
 

In the days when I used to toil in the dark satanic mills of a major global corporation, I remember attending a global conference of execs in Australia, prior to which we all visited some of the business units in various parts of Asia.

At a big dinner at the conference attended by all the top corporate walla-wallas, the president of my unit (an American) made a speech thanking our host (an Australian) for arranging all our trips to the "Far East".

The Ozzie went bersek and tore into the Yank for several minutes, in front of all present, about how his use of this phrase exposed his cultural insensitiviy and American parochialism. It's only "far" or "east" from where you ugly Americans and Europeans are sitting was more or less the gist of the tirade. (Come to think of it this was total nonsense as the Far East is west of the USA.)

Personally I don't like being called a "Brit". Just as it's not politically correct to refer to a Jewish person as "that Jew", I prefer that you refer to my countrymen as "British people".
 

So, tillerman, do you think the wikipedia entry is inaccurate? Is the word 'oriental' just as derogatory in Europe?

It's strange how some words come to be derogatory and others do not. If you think about it, "Asian" is also very inaccurate as far as location, but it's the standard word right now.

Personally, there's not one name you could level at me that I'd find offensive, but I'm just Joe White Guy.
 

Maybe in the US at least it could be traced to Edward Said's book Orientalism (1978), in which Said uses the term as a way to talk about Western civ privileging its own culture as transcendant or universal while placing others in limited or inferior positions.

At least that would be my guess.
 

I think any time you use a word to refer to one people by a name that is by definition relative to another people you are asking for trouble ...

You're an infidel because you don't belive the same as me.
You're oriental because I'm in the center of the universe and you are east of me.
You're an Indian because ...ummm .. umm ...well, I guess because Columbus screwed up.
 

...you're Asian because you have smaller eyes than me but I have no idea what country you're from.
 

I'm only half-Asian, so maybe this answer is only half right. My understanding is that "oriental" is an adjective to be applied to objects and "Asian" applies to humans.
 

Check the dutch:

http://thecarnivoreproject.typepad.com/the_carnivore_project/2007/10/mcoriental-amst.html
 

This comment has been removed by the author.
 

I only recently found out that using the word 'Oriental' to describe a person is derogatory but it is for pretty simple reasons I suppose, so it's just as easy to use the term 'East Asian', since 'Asian' seems to apply too generally, and tends to be used for people from the Indian subcontinent. Pretty simple - it's just the part of the world map that their family hails from.

It's not much to ask. All this political correctness does often seem to make even the most general conversation a minefield but you must agree that East Asian people are hardly most complain-y people when compared to other ethnic groups.
 

Why is everyone so sensitive? I am a Jew. I don't mind being called a Jew. I don't refer to black people as African Americans, because I grew up referring to them as black people, and I don't refer to myself as a European American. I'm white, their black we are all the same underneath, and really? WHO CARES?
 

I was born in East Asia, lived all my life almost in the U.S., and the first time someone referred to me as oriental I was confused. Since when did they use words that described objects and location to describe people? Since when was it okay to generalize and say, "that's black" or "that's white"? How is that even relevant? How do you know if the person is thinking the same as you when you make such generalizations?
 

A friend came up to me at a funeral and commented on my beautiful jacket. She was surprised to see me in it and wondered if we had travelled to Asia. I said, "actually i have several oriental jackets and just love them". She interupted me mid-sentence and said..."You mean Asian jackets". I said "no I mean oriental jackets" "no, she said, the word is Asian".

so my question is, "when did it become poitically correct to confront a friend who is in profound grief because of the death of a very close friend, and argue with them about the proper use of a word?" The appropriate word is RUDE.
 

I don't mind if people call me "oriental." It's a pretty meaningless word really.
 

Why is it necessary to refer to their race period? If you didcussing business, then refer to them with their property title. If its a personal topic , they should be called a friend, acquaintence or etc. Calling out their race when its not necessary is inappropiate for the vast majority